U.S. patent number 9,618,851 [Application Number 14/802,606] was granted by the patent office on 2017-04-11 for photoinduced alignment apparatus.
This patent grant is currently assigned to BOE TECHNOLOGY GROUP CO., LTD., CHENGDU BOE OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.. The grantee listed for this patent is BOE TECHNOLOGY GROUP CO., LTD., CHENGDU BOE OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.. Invention is credited to Jinyang Deng, Feng Liu, Yin Xiao.
United States Patent |
9,618,851 |
Xiao , et al. |
April 11, 2017 |
Photoinduced alignment apparatus
Abstract
The present invention relates to photoinduced alignment
apparatus, comprising a plurality of supporting bases used to
support substrates; an exposure device exposing the substrates on
the supporting base; a driving mechanism driving the exposure
device to move, so that the exposure device passes through the
substrates on the plurality of the supporting bases, successively;
and a loading and unloading device used to load and unload a
substrate on a supporting base beyond the irradiation range of the
exposure device.
Inventors: |
Xiao; Yin (Beijing,
CN), Liu; Feng (Beijing, CN), Deng;
Jinyang (Beijing, CN) |
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
BOE TECHNOLOGY GROUP CO., LTD.
CHENGDU BOE OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD. |
Beijing
Chengdu, Sichuan Province |
N/A
N/A |
CN
CN |
|
|
Assignee: |
BOE TECHNOLOGY GROUP CO., LTD.
(Beijing, CN)
CHENGDU BOE OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD. (Chengdu,
Sichuan Province, CN)
|
Family
ID: |
53429851 |
Appl.
No.: |
14/802,606 |
Filed: |
July 17, 2015 |
Prior Publication Data
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|
|
|
Document
Identifier |
Publication Date |
|
US 20160252822 A1 |
Sep 1, 2016 |
|
Foreign Application Priority Data
|
|
|
|
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Feb 28, 2015 [CN] |
|
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2015 2 0119871 U |
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Current U.S.
Class: |
1/1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
G02F
1/1303 (20130101); G02F 1/133788 (20130101); G03F
7/70058 (20130101) |
Current International
Class: |
G03B
27/42 (20060101); G03F 7/20 (20060101) |
References Cited
[Referenced By]
U.S. Patent Documents
Primary Examiner: Asfaw; Mesfin
Attorney, Agent or Firm: Nath, Goldberg & Meyer
Goldberg; Joshua B. Thomas; Christopher
Claims
The invention claimed is:
1. A photoinduced alignment apparatus, comprising a plurality of
supporting bases, each of the supporting bases being used to
support a substrate, the photoinduced alignment apparatus further
comprising: an exposure device exposing a substrate on a supporting
base within an irradiation range thereof; a driving mechanism
driving the exposure device to move, so that the irradiation range
of the exposure device passes through the plurality of the
supporting bases, successively; and a loading and unloading device
used to unload an exposed substrate on a supporting base beyond the
irradiation range of the exposure device, and to load a new
substrate onto a supporting base beyond the irradiation range of
the exposure device.
2. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 1,
wherein the plurality of the supporting bases are arranged in a
line.
3. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 1,
wherein the loading and unloading device comprises a loading device
and an unloading device, the unloading device unloads an exposed
substrate on a supporting base beyond the irradiation range of the
exposure device, and the loading device loads a new substrate onto
a supporting base beyond the irradiation range of the exposure
device.
4. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 1,
further comprising a shielding device configured to move to a light
exiting area of the exposure device at a preset time, so that a
supporting base within the irradiation range of the exposure device
is not irradiated by the exposure device.
5. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 1,
wherein the exposure device comprises a light source, a reflector
and a reflector driving mechanism, the reflector driving mechanism
drives the reflector to move between a first position and a second
position, and the reflector, when in the first position, reflects
light, emitted by the light source towards a non-light exiting
area, to a light exiting area; and when in the second position,
shields the light exiting area.
6. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 5,
wherein the light source comprises at least one set of lamps, and a
length of the set of lamps is greater than or equal to a length of
a diagonal line of the substrate on the supporting base.
7. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 6,
wherein there is 1 to 50 lamps in the set of lamps.
8. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 1,
wherein a size of the light exiting area of the exposure device, in
a direction perpendicular to a direction of motion thereof, is
greater than or equal to a length of a diagonal line of the
substrate on the supporting base.
9. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 8,
wherein the size of the light exiting area of the exposure device,
in the direction perpendicular to the direction of motion thereof,
is less than or equal to 5 m.
10. The photoinduced alignment apparatus according to claim 1,
wherein the loading and unloading device comprises a plurality of
loading and unloading devices corresponding to each of the
plurality of the supporting bases, respectively.
Description
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to the field of liquid crystal
display technology, in particular to photoinduced alignment
apparatus.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
A liquid crystal display panel generally includes an array
substrate, a color filter substrate, and liquid crystals provided
between the array substrate and the color filter substrate. The
array substrate and the color filter substrate both include an
alignment layer configured to restrict arrangement of liquid
crystal molecules, so that the liquid crystal molecules, when not
in an electric field, are arranged in a preset initial
direction.
At present, the alignment layer generally may be manufactured by
rubbing or exposing a polyimide film (PI film), that is so called
"rubbing alignment" or "photoinduced alignment". A photoinduced
alignment process is a process in which PI film is irradiated with
UV light to cause photo polymerization, photo-isomerization or
photo-decomposition reaction in polyimide molecules in the PI film,
so as to bring on anisotropy to induce the alignment of the liquid
crystal molecules. In the photoinduced alignment process, the PI
film does not contact other media. Hence problems such as scraping
contamination and electrostatic breakdown in a rubbing alignment
process will not occur.
FIG. 1 illustrates a schematic diagram of an existing photoinduced
alignment apparatus.
As shown in FIG. 1, the photoinduced alignment apparatus includes a
supporting base 1, an exposure device 2, a diving mechanism (not
shown in the figure) and a loading and unloading device 4. The
supporting base 1 are used to support a substrate S, the exposure
device 2 exposes a substrate S placed on the supporting base 1, the
driving mechanism drives the supporting base 1 to move, and the
loading and unloading device 4 is used to load a substrate S onto
the supporting base 1 and to unload a substrate S from the
supporting base 1.
When the alignment layer is manufactured by using the photoinduced
alignment apparatus shown in FIG. 1, in a first stage, the loading
and unloading device 4 loads a substrate S having a PI film
prepared thereon to the supporting base 1, and detects whether the
substrate S is placed accurately. In the first stage, a shielding
device is used to shield a light exiting area of the exposure
device 2, to avoid exposing only a portion of the substrate S and
thus to avoid influencing the uniformity of the exposure process.
In a second stage, the shielding device is removed from the light
exiting area of the exposure device 2, and then, the driving
mechanism drives the supporting base 1 to move from an initial
position 1-0 to an end position 1-1. During this process, each area
of the substrate S is exposed by the exposure device 2, so that
photo polymerization, photo-isomerization or photo-decomposition
reaction occur in the PI film on the substrate S, so as to bring on
superficial anisotropy. In a third stage, the driving mechanism
drives the supporting base 1 to move back to the initial position
1-0, and the loading and unloading device 4 unloads the substrate S
from the supporting base 1.
During manufacturing an alignment layer by using the above
photoinduced alignment apparatus, when the substrate S is loaded or
unloaded, when it is detected whether the substrate S is placed
accurately, and when the shielding device shields the light exiting
area of the exposure device 2, the exposure device 2 cannot perform
irradiation on the substrate S on the supporting base 1 to expose
the substrate S. As a result, in each period of manufacturing the
alignment layer, the proportion of exposure time is small, thus the
utilization of the exposure device 2 is low.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The object of the present invention is to provide a photoinduced
alignment apparatus, which can reduce the time required to finish
exposing one substrate, thus to improve the production efficiency,
and improve the utilization of the expose device.
According to one aspect of the present invention, a photoinduced
alignment apparatus is provided, including a plurality of
supporting bases, each of the supporting bases being used to
support a substrate. The photoinduced alignment apparatus further
includes: an exposure device exposing a substrate on a supporting
base within an irradiation range thereof; a driving mechanism
driving the exposure device to move, so that the irradiation range
of the exposure device passes through the plurality of the
supporting bases, successively; and a loading and unloading device
used to unload an exposed substrate on a supporting base beyond the
irradiation range of the exposure device, and to load a new
substrate onto a supporting base beyond the irradiation range of
the exposure device.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the plurality of the
supporting bases may be arranged in a line.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the loading and unloading
device may include a loading device and an unloading device. The
unloading device unloads an exposed substrate on a supporting base
beyond the irradiation range of the exposure device. The loading
device loads a new substrate onto a supporting base beyond the
irradiation range of the exposure device.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the photoinduced alignment
apparatus may further include a shielding device configured to move
to a light exiting area of the exposure device at a preset time, so
that a supporting base within the irradiation range of the exposure
device is not irradiated by the exposure device.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the exposure device may
include a light source, a reflector and a reflector driving
mechanism. The reflector driving mechanism drives the reflector to
move between a first position and a second position. The reflector,
when in the first position, reflects light, emitted by the light
source towards a non-light exiting area, to a light exiting area,
and when in the second position, shields the light exiting
area.
According to an exemplary embodiment, a size of the light exiting
area of the exposure device, in a direction perpendicular to a
direction of motion thereof, may be greater than or equal to a
length of a diagonal line of the substrate on the supporting
base.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the size of the light exiting
area of the exposure device, in the direction perpendicular to the
direction of motion thereof, may be less than or equal to 5 m.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the light source may include
at least one set of lamps, and a length of the set of lamps is
greater than or equal to a length of a diagonal line of the
substrate on the supporting base.
According to an exemplary embodiment, there may be 1 to 50 lamps in
the set of lamps.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the loading and unloading
device may include a plurality of loading and unloading devices
corresponding to each of the plurality of the supporting bases,
respectively.
According to the photoinduced alignment apparatus of the present
invention, the driving mechanism may drive the exposure device to
expose the substrates on the plurality of the supporting bases,
successively. While the exposure device exposes a substrate on a
supporting base, the loading and unloading device may unload an
exposed substrate from another supporting base and load a new
substrate onto the supporting base before the exposure device
passes through the supporting base next time. The exposure device,
when passes through the supporting base again, may expose the
substrate on the supporting base directly without waiting for the
loading and unloading device to unload and load the substrate, thus
to reduce the time required to finish exposing one substrate, and
improve the production efficiency and increase the production
capacity. Meanwhile, when the loading and unloading device unloads
and loads a substrate from and onto a supporting base, the exposure
device may still be exposing substrates on other supporting bases.
Therefore, compared with the prior art, the utilization of the
exposure device is improved,
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Accompanying drawings are used for providing further understanding
of the present invention, constitute a part of the specification
and are used for explaining the present invention together with the
following specific implementations, but are not intended to limit
the present invention. In the drawings:
FIG. 1 illustrates a schematic diagram of existing photoinduced
alignment apparatus;
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of photoinduced alignment apparatus
according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 3 illustrates an embodiment in which there are four supporting
bases;
FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of a shielding device in the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to an exemplary
embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of an exposure device in the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to an exemplary
embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of exposure uniformity of the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to an exemplary
embodiment of the present invention and that of a photoinduced
alignment apparatus in the prior art;
FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of an exemplary structure of a set of
lamps in the photoinduced alignment apparatus according to an
exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of another exemplary structure of the
set of lamps in the photoinduced alignment apparatus according to
an exemplary embodiment of the present invention; and
FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram of still another exemplary structure
of the set of lamps in the photoinduced alignment apparatus
according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS
The specific implementations of the present invention will be
further described as below in details with reference to the
accompanying drawings. It should be understood that the specific
implementations described here are merely used to describe and
explain the present invention, and not intended to limit the
present invention.
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of photoinduced alignment apparatus
according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
As shown in FIG. 2, the photoinduced alignment apparatus may
include a plurality of supporting bases 1, each of the supporting
bases 1 being used to support a substrate S; the photoinduced
alignment may further include: an exposure device 2 exposing a
substrate S on a supporting base 1 within an irradiation range
thereof; a driving mechanism (not shown in the figure) driving the
exposure device 2 to move, so that the irradiation range of the
exposure device 2 passes through the plurality of the supporting
bases 1, successively (i.e. the substrates S on the plurality of
the supporting bases 1 come into the irradiation range of the
exposure device 2, successively, and go out of the irradiation
range of the exposure device 2, successively); and a loading and
unloading device 4 used to unload an exposed substrate S on a
supporting base 1 beyond the irradiation range of the exposure
device 2, and to load a new substrate onto a supporting base 1
beyond the irradiation range of the exposure device 2.
A process in which the photoinduced alignment apparatus performs an
exposure and alignment operation on the substrate S will be further
described in detail as below with reference to the FIG. 2.
As shown in FIG. 2, there may be (but not limited to) two
supporting bases 1, and the supporting bases 1 are arranged in a
line. The exposure device 2, before exposure, is in an initial
position 2-0 which is between the two supporting bases 1.
Irradiation intensity of the exposure device 2 may be set so that
the exposure device 2 finishes exposing a substrate S on a
supporting base 1 after passing through the same supporting base 1
twice. For example, after the exposure device 2 moves from the
initial position 2-0 to a first position 2-1 and then back to the
initial position 2-0, i.e., passing through a supporting base 1' on
the left side in FIG. 2 twice, exposure of the above substrate S
may be completed.
Before exposure, a substrate S is placed on at least one supporting
base 1 through the loading and unloading device 4, and during the
placement process, the placed substrate S is not irradiated by the
exposure device 2. For example, before exposure, a substrate S may
be placed on the supporting base 1' on the left side in FIG. 2. For
example, when a substrate S is loaded onto the supporting base 1, a
gate 6 may be opened first; then, the loading and unloading device
4 picks up the substrate S, carries it above the supporting base 1,
and places it on the supporting base 1; and finally, the loading
and unloading device 4 exits, and the gate 6 is closed.
After the loading and unloading device 4 places the substrate S
onto the supporting base 1, it is detected whether the substrate S
is placed accurately. The detection may be preformed, for example,
by a camera 7 close to the supporting base 1. The camera 7 may,
when detecting a deviation of the placing position of the substrate
S, correct the position of the substrate S.
After it is determined that the substrate S is placed accurately,
the supporting base 1 usually may be driven by a rotary driving
mechanism (not shown in the figure) connected thereto to rotate a
corresponding angle, so that a trench formed on the substrate S may
be arranged in a preset direction.
The exposure device 2 may expose the substrate S well placed. For
example, the driving mechanism may drive the exposure device 2 to
move from the initial position 2-0 to the first position 2-1, and
then back from the first position 2-1 to the initial position 2-0.
During this process, the exposure device 2 passes through the
substrate S placed on the supporting base 1' twice and irradiates
the substrate S on the supporting base 1' twice, thus to finish the
exposure of the substrate S. While the substrate S on the
supporting base 1' is exposed, another substrate S may be loaded
onto a supporting base 1'' on the right side in FIG. 2 through the
loading and unloading device 4, whether the substrate S is placed
accurately is detected, and the supporting base 1'' is rotated a
preset angle.
After the exposure device 2 moves back to the initial position 2-0,
the driving mechanism continuously drives the exposure device 2 to
move toward the right side of the FIG. 2 to the second position
2-2, then back from the second position 2-2 to the initial position
2-0. During this process, the exposure device 2 passes through the
substrate S placed on the supporting base 1'' twice and irradiates
the substrate S on the supporting base 1'' twice, thus to finish
the exposure of the substrate S. While the substrate S on the
supporting base 1'' is exposed, the substrate S, which is placed on
the supporting base 1' and well exposed, may be unloaded through
the loading and unloading device 4, a new substrate S may be loaded
onto the supporting base 1', whether the new substrate S is placed
accurately is detected, and the supporting base 1' is rotated a
preset angle.
By repeating the above operation steps, a continuous exposure
process of a plurality of substrates S may be realized.
It may be known according to the above description that when an
exposed substrate S is unloaded from a certain supporting base (for
example, supporting base 1') and a new substrate S is loaded onto
the supporting base, the exposure device 2 has driven by the
driving mechanism to move to a position corresponding to other
supporting base (for example, supporting base 1'') and exposes a
substrate on the other supporting base. As a result, the exposure
device 2 does not irradiate a supporting base on which a
loading/unloading operation is performed. Therefore, when the
exposure device 2 exposes the substrates on other supporting bases,
the loading and unloading device may perform a loading and
unloading operation on the substrate S on which an exposure
operation has been performed. In this way, when the exposure device
2 moves to a position corresponding to a supporting base next time,
a substrate S has been placed on the supporting base, so that the
exposure device 2 directly exposes the substrate S on the
supporting base without waiting for the loading and unloading
device 4 to perform a loading/unloading operation on the substrate
S. Hence, compared with the prior art, the present invention may
save time, improve the production efficiency and increase the
production capacity. Meanwhile, when the loading and unloading
device 4 performs a loading/unloading operation on a substrate S,
the exposure device 2 may still be exposing substrates S on other
supporting bases. Therefore, compared with the prior art, the
utilization of the exposure device 2 is improved.
Table 1 illustrates a comparison of time required to finish
exposing one substrate for the photoinduced alignment apparatus
according to the exemplary embodiment of the present invention and
for the photoinduced alignment apparatus according the prior art
respectively.
TABLE-US-00001 TABLE 1 Time required to finish Loading exposing
Rotating and one Utilization Irradiation time of the unloading
substrate of light time (sec) bases (sec) time (sec) (sec) (%) The
prior art 96 18 10 124 77.42 This 96 0 0 96 100.00 embodiment
In the comparison example of the prior art and this embodiment, the
size of the substrate S in the prior art and that in this
embodiment are both 1850.times.1500 mm. As shown in Table 1, the
irradiation time required to finish the exposure is 96 seconds.
According to the exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the
time required to finish the exposure of one substrate S is the
irradiation time, that is, 96 seconds; however, in the solution of
the prior art, in addition to the irradiation time required to
finish the exposure, the time for the loading and unloading device
4 to perform the loading and unloading operation (the time is 10
seconds) and the time for the supporting base 1 to rotate a preset
angle (the time is 18 seconds) are further required to be waited.
Therefore, the time required to finish exposing one substrate S is
the sum of the above time required, that is, 124 seconds. It may be
known from the comparison that the time required to finish exposing
one substrate S in the exemplary embodiment of the present
invention is reduced by 22.58% relative to that in the comparison
example in the prior art; the utilization of the exposure device 2
in the comparison example of the prior art is 77.42% while that in
the exemplary embodiment of the present invention is 100.00%.
According to this exemplary embodiment, the number of supporting
bases 1 is not limited to 2 as illustrated in FIG. 2, and there may
be more than two supporting bases 1. For example, in an embodiment
illustrated in FIG. 3, there are four supporting bases 1. In
addition, the arrangement of the supporting bases 1 is not limited
to be in a line. When the plurality of supporting bases 1 are
arranged in a line, a moving path of the exposure device 2 is
relatively simple, so the structure of the driving mechanism is
also relatively simple. However, in practice, the supporting bases
1 may be arranged in various other forms, for example, arranged in
multiple rows and multiple columns.
As shown in FIG. 2, the initial position 2-0 is located between the
supporting base 1' and the supporting base 1'', but the present
invention is not limited thereto. For example, the initial position
2-0 may also be further located on the left side of the supporting
base 1' or on the right side of the supporting base F. In addition,
when there are more than two supporting bases, the initial position
2-0 may also be located between any two supporting bases.
In addition, in the exemplary embodiment described with reference
to FIG. 2, the exposure device 2 is required to pass through the
substrate S twice to finish the exposure of the substrate S, but
the present invention is not limited thereto. For example,
according to requirements, by increasing the irradiation intensity
of the exposure device 2, the exposure device 2 may be allowed to
finish the exposure of the substrate S after passing through the
substrate S once. Hence, the time required for the exposure process
may be reduced, thus improving the production efficiency. In
addition, the number of times for the exposure device 2 to pass
through the substrate S for exposure may be set to other
values.
According to the exemplary embodiment, the loading and unloading
device 4 may include a loading device 40 and an unloading device
41. The unloading device 41 unloads an exposed substrate S on a
supporting base 1 beyond the irradiation range of the exposure
device 2. The loading device 40 loads a new substrate S onto a
supporting base 1 beyond the irradiation range of the exposure
device 2. According to the exemplary embodiment, the loading device
40 and the unloading device 41 both may be manipulators. Compared
with the way of using a manipulator to perform a loading/and
unloading operation on the substrate S, synchronously performing a
loading operation and an unloading operation respectively by the
loading device 40 and the unloading device 41 may reduce time
required to load and unload a substrate, so that the driving
mechanism can drive the exposure device 2 at a higher speed. This
is helpful to improving the production efficiency.
According to the exemplary embodiment, the loading and unloading
device 4 may include a plurality of loading and unloading devices 4
corresponding to each of the plurality of the supporting bases 1,
respectively. That is to say, each of the loading and unloading
devices 4 is used to perform the loading and unloading operation on
a substrate S on one supporting base 1.
In general, after the exposure process, subsequent processes (for
example, developing, etc) are acquired to be performed in order to
obtain the required trenches on the PI film. According to the
exemplary embodiment, the unloading device 41, after unloading the
substrate S from the supporting base 1, carries the substrate S to
a next production process following the exposure process. The
exposed substrate S may be carried to the subsequent production
processes, directly. Compared with the existing way of first
storing the exposed substrate S and then carrying a plurality of
substrates S together to the next production process, the present
embodiment realizes reduced time and improved efficiency. This is
helpful to improving the production capacity.
FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of a shielding device in the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to an exemplary
embodiment of the present invention.
According the exemplary embodiment, as shown in FIG. 4, the
photoinduced alignment apparatus may further include a shielding
device 5 configured to move to a light exiting area of the exposure
device 2 at a preset time, so that a supporting base 1 within the
irradiation range of the exposure device 2 is not irradiated by the
exposure device 2.
Referring to FIG. 2 again, if, according to a practical situation,
the initial position 2-0 is required to be located on the left side
of the supporting base 1' and the first position 2-1 is required to
be located between the supporting base 1' and the supporting base
1'', the second position 2-2 is maintained in a position
illustrated in FIG. 2, and finishing the exposure of the substrate
S requires the exposure device 2 to pass through a corresponding
supporting base 1 twice (that is, moving from the initial position
2-0 to the first position 2-1 and then moving back to the initial
position 2-0), then, the exposure device 2 will be on the left side
of the supporting base 1' after the substrate S placed on the
supporting base 1 is well exposed. When the exposure device 2 moves
again to expose the substrate S on the supporting base 1'', the
supporting base 1' will be within the irradiation range of the
exposure device 2. In this case, if the loading and unloading
device 4 performs a loading and unloading operation on the
substrate S on the supporting base 1', uneven exposure intensity of
the substrate S will be caused. As a result, the uniformity of the
trenches formed on the substrate S will be influenced. Therefore,
the shielding device 5 is required to shield the light exiting area
of the exposure device 2, so that the supporting base 1' within the
irradiation range of the exposure device 2 is not irradiated by the
exposure device 2.
In addition, in a case where the exposure device 2 is required to
perform an odd number of times of irradiations before finishing the
exposure of the substrate S, when the exposure device 2 moves to
the supporting bases 1 located at both ends (i.e. the first
supporting base and the last supporting base among the supporting
bases arranged in a line), a similar problem also occurs. In this
case, the shielding device 5 is required to shield the light
exiting area of the exposure device 2.
FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of an exposure device in the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to an exemplary
embodiment of the present invention.
According the exemplary embodiment, the shielding device 5 may be
not arranged, but an exposure device 2 including a light source 20,
a reflector 21 and a reflector driving mechanism (not shown in the
figure) is arranged instead. As shown in FIG. 5, the light source
20 emits light, and the reflector driving mechanism drives the
reflector 21 to move between the first position and the second
position. The reflector 21, when in the first position, reflects
light, emitted by the light source 20 towards a non-light exiting
area, to a light exiting area, and when in the second position,
shields the light exiting area (i.e. serving as a shielding
device). For example, when the exposure device 2 is required to
stop moving in order to wait the loading and unloading device 4 to
perform a loading and unloading operation on the substrate S on the
supporting base 1, the reflector 21 may be in the second
position.
According to the exemplary embodiment, the size of the light
exiting area of the exposure device 2, in a direction perpendicular
to the direction of motion thereof, may be greater than or equal to
the length of a diagonal line of the substrate S on the supporting
base 1, so that when the supporting base 1 rotates any angle, each
area of the substrate S on the supporting base 1 is within the
irradiation range of the exposure device 2. In general, the length
of a diagonal line of the substrate S is not greater than 5 m, so
the size of the light exiting area of the exposure device 2, in a
direction perpendicular to the direction of motion thereof, may be
set less than or equal to 5 m.
According to the exemplary embodiment, the driving mechanism drives
the exposure device 2 to move at a speed less than 1500 mm/s, so
that the exposure device 2 has enough stability and accuracy during
the movement, thus to ensure the uniform exposure of the substrate
S.
In general, there are a plurality of thimbles arranged on the
supporting base 1, and the substrate S is fixed on the thimbles.
When the supporting base 1 moves, the substrate S vibrates
therewith, so that the flatness of a surface of the substrate S
becomes poor. According to the exemplary embodiment of the present
invention, when the substrate S is exposed, the supporting base 1
remains fixed while the exposure device 2 moves. Compared with the
technical solution of the prior art, the surface of the supporting
base 1 may maintain good flatness. Specifically, the flatness of
the substrate S may achieve .+-.0.05 mm to .+-.10 mm, so that
better exposure uniformity may be obtained.
FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of exposure uniformity of the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to the exemplary
embodiment of the present invention and that of a photoinduced
alignment apparatus in the prior art.
As shown in FIG. 6, the exposure uniformity obtained by the
photoinduced alignment apparatus according to the exemplary
embodiment of the present invention is indicated by a solid line,
and the exposure uniformity implemented according to the prior art
is indicated by a dashed line. It may be seen from this figure that
the photoinduced alignment apparatus according to the example
embodiment of the present invention is superior to that in the
prior art.
FIGS. 7-9 are schematic diagrams of various exemplary structures of
a set of lamps in the photoinduced alignment apparatus according to
an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
According to the exemplary embodiment, the light source 20 may
include at least one set of lamps 200, and the length of each set
of lamps 20 is greater than or equal to the length of a diagonal
line of the substrate S on the supporting base 1. FIG. 7
illustrates that each set of lamps 200 may be constituted of lamps
with large length; FIGS. 8 and 9 show that a set of lamps 200 may
be formed by connecting a plurality of lamps with small length with
each other. The length of each of the lamps may range from 200 mm
to 5000 mm, and there may be 1 to 50 lamps in each set of lamps
200.
According to the photoinduced alignment apparatus of the exemplary
embodiments of the present invention, the exposure device 2 exposes
the substrates S on the plurality of the supporting bases 1,
successively, and while the exposure device 2 exposes the
substrates S, the loading and unloading device 4 may unload an
exposed substrate S from the supporting base 1 and load a new
substrate S onto the supporting base 1 before the exposure device 2
passes through the supporting base 1 next time, so that the
exposure device 2 may directly expose the substrate S on the
supporting base 1 without waiting for the loading and unloading
device 4 to perform a loading and unloading operation on the
substrate S. Hence, compared with the prior art, the present
invention may save time required to finish exposing one substrate
S, improve the production efficiency and increase the production
capacity. Meanwhile, when the loading and unloading device 4
performs a loading and unloading operation on a substrate S, the
exposure device 2 may still be exposing substrates S on other
supporting bases. Therefore, compared with the prior art, the
utilization of the exposure device 2 is improved.
It may be understood that the above exemplary embodiments are
merely exemplary implementations used to describe the principle of
the present invention, but the present invention is not limited
thereto. For a person of ordinary skill in the art, various
variations and improvements may be made without departing from the
spirit and essence of the present invention, and those variations
and improvements should also be regarded as falling into the
protection scope of the present invention.
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